Miss Beatrice Townsend

1882

John Singer Sargent

Painter, American, 1856 - 1925

Shown from the hips up, a pale-skinned young girl wearing an ink-black garment with a cream-white collar and a coral-red sash and necklaces holds a terrier dog as she looks at us in this vertical portrait painting. The artist used brushstrokes throughout, especially in the hair, clothing, dog, and background. The girl’s body is slightly angled to our left but she turns her oval face to us. She slightly cocks one faint brow as she gazes out with large, pale blue eyes. She has smooth cheeks, and her full, red lips are closed. Her chestnut-brown hair curtains her forehead in thick bangs and falls down past her shoulders. Her black dress has long, tightly-fitting sleeves and is cinched with a wide, oversized red sash, presumably tied at the back. A multi-stranded, coral-red necklace lies over her layered, cream-white lace collar, which extends just past her shoulders. A long, white cuff falls over her left wrist, down by her side. With her other hand, to our left, she supports the terrier against her right hip. The long fur around the dog’s dark eyes is shimmering, flax brown. Caramel-brown ears poke up on its shaggy head. The girl holds the dog's tail in that hand. The background behind the pair lightens from fawn brown across the top to golden brown along the bottom edge. The artist inscribed and signed the painting in slanting, cursive letters at the top right corner: “to my friend Mrs Townsend John S. Sargent.”

Media Options

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Eleanor Beatrice Townsend (1870–1884) was the sixth of seven children born to John Joseph Townsend, a New York attorney and politician, and his wife, Catherine Rebecca Bronson Townsend, a friend of John Singer Sargent’s and the subject of her own portrait by the artist.

Portraits of children are among Sargent’s earliest works and remain some of his most captivating paintings. Rather than idealized images of childhood, the artist’s lively likenesses serve as character studies of his young sitters. The presence of a favorite toy or pet, such as the small terrier Beatrice clutches to her side, serves to emphasize the sitter’s individual personality. As one art historian noted, “Sargent’s sensitivity to the complexities, intensities, and uncertainties of adolescence, especially of females, is a marked feature of his portraiture.” Here, Sargent captures the confidence and self-possession of his young subject as she meets the viewer’s gaze head-on. Sadly, only two years after this painting was completed, Beatrice died of peritonitis at age fourteen.

On View

West Building Main Floor, Gallery 69

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Artwork overview

  • Medium

    oil on canvas

  • Credit Line

    Collection of Mr. and Mrs. Paul Mellon

  • Dimensions

    overall: 79.4 x 58.4 cm (31 1/4 x 23 in.)
    framed: 97.8 x 74.1 x 3.2 cm (38 1/2 x 29 3/16 x 1 1/4 in.)

  • Accession

    2006.128.31

Artwork history & notes

Provenance

Probably the sitter's parents, John Joseph Townsend [1825-1889] and Catherine Bronson Townsend [1833-1926].[1] (Carroll Carstairs Gallery, New York), by at least 1931;[2] sold 1936 to Andrew W. Mellon [1855-1937], Pittsburgh and Washington, D.C.;[3] gift to his son, Paul Mellon [1907-1999], Upperville, Virginia;[4] bequest 1999 to NGA, with life interest to his wife, Rachel Lambert Mellon; life interest released 2006.
[1] Sargent also painted John J. Townsend in 1882, and two portraits of Catherine Bronson Townsend. The Bronsons were part of the artist's expatriate circle in Florence, and the Townsend's patronage most likely resulted from old family ties, although contemporary details concerning the commissions have yet to emerge. See Richard Ormond and Elaine Kilmurray, John Singer Sargent: The Early Portraits. Complete Paintings, Volume I, New Haven and London, 1998: nos. 43-46.
[2] Mr. Carstairs lent the painting to a 1931 exhibition.
[3] It was announced in the 27 April 1936 issue of Art News (p. 12) that the painting had "recently been sold by the Carroll Carstairs Gallery ... to a private Collector in Washington," who was probably Andrew Mellon. The article also said the painting "comes directly from the Townsend estate."
[4] Mrs. Paul Mellon, in a letter of 20 June 2006 to Earl A. Powell III, writes that the painting "was the only picture that [Mr. Mellon's] father Andrew Mellon gave him" (copy in NGA curatorial files).

Associated Names

Exhibition History

1931

  • Pictures of People 1870-1930, A Loan Exhibition for the Benefit of Hope Farm, M. Knoedler & Co., New York, 1931, no. 11, repro.

1932

  • American Painting & Sculpture, The Museum of Modern Art, New York, 1932-1933, no. 91, repro.

Bibliography

1934

  • Carstairs, Carroll. Postscript to Criticism. London, 1934: 42, frontispiece.

1956

  • McKibbin, David. Sargent's Boston. Exh. cat. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, 1956: 126.

1969

  • Mount, Charles Merrill. John Singer Sargent: A Biography. Rev. ed. (originally published 1955). New York, 1969: 429, no. 8210.

1970

  • Ormond, Richard. John Singer Sargent: Paintings, Drawings, Watercolors. New York, 1970: 31, 239, pl. 26.

1996

  • The Age of Elegance: The Paintings of John Singer Sargent. London, 1996: repro.

1998

  • Ormond, Richard, and Elaine Kilmurray. John Singer Sargent: The Early Portraits. The Complete Paintings, Volume I. New Haven and London, 1998: no. 46, repro.

2004

  • Gallati, Barbara Dyer. Great Expectations: John Singer Sargent Painting Children. Exh. cat. Brooklyn Museum; Chrysler Museum of Art, Norfolk; Portland (Oregon) Art Museum. Brooklyn, 2004: 58, 72, 156, 248, pl. 18.

2005

  • Syme, Alison Mairi. "Hedgewhores, Wagtails, Cocatrices, Whipsters: John Singer Sargent and his Coterie of Nature's Artful Dodgers." Ph.D dissertation, Harvard University, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 2005: 49-50, fig. 2.12.

Inscriptions

upper center and right: to my friend Mrs Townsend / John S. Sargent

Wikidata ID

Q20189519

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